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DEATH IS CALLING

30/09/2016 09:29:00 By Martin Dlamini

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IS the government cash-flow crisis now a matter of life and death? Well, when health workers down tools and patients are turned away with nowhere to go, then the answer is most probably yes. More so if you have babies born on a hospital floor while a state of the art maternity ward lies idle, simply because government can’t afford to hire the staff needed to use it.

Government has also failed to raise E26 million to pay hospital orderlies their dues. Put these together and we have a situation where visiting a hospital provides no guarantee of life. These scenarios played themselves out the past weeks and serve as loud warning bells that something urgent needs to be done before we start counting dead bodies.

Recently government conceded that it was living from hand to mouth on a daily basis as it was struggling to raise the necessary funding to meet its national obligations. These include subventions to institutions like the Good Shepherd Hospital in Siteki where, as a result of non payment, the health personnel resolved to stop work, leaving patients stranded.
Meanwhile, nurses at the Mbabane Government Hospital marched to the Health Ministry to deliver a petition calling for 33 additional nurses to be deployed to the new maternity wing, as the 29 nurses available can’t cope with the high number of expectant mothers needing their service.

Recently three women are reported to have delivered their babies in the hospital corridors after they were told to go elsewhere because the hospital could not accommodate them.
The nurses have resolved to turn the pregnant women away. This is, no doubt, a threat to the lives of both the women and children because all it means is transferring the problem to the nearest hospital or clinic, if not causing more babies to be delivered in kombis, hospital corridors or street pavements. This can’t be allowed to happen.

These developments bring to light two aspects of government spending that need serious review. The first is that of the number of institutions receiving subventions from government which has been rising sharply over the past few years. It has evidently reached a point where the numbers are unsustainable, especially when the country’s sources of income are on the decline.

Our Business Desk revealed that government has 40 parastatals, 78 per cent of which are non-profit making. Over E650 million, excluding subventions to municipalities around the country, was spent on these institutions for the previous financial year. Health services are regarded a priority in government spending but the patients turned away at the hospital would strongly disagree. Who knows if all of them were able to afford a trip to other health institutions for treatment? Chances are they were referred to the hospital by the clinics.

To save these lives requires a serious review of the number of parastatals in this country. Finance Minister Martin Dlamini once raised the concern about there being too many parastatals but we have seen nothing come out of this concern, except possible death of poor people who can’t afford private doctors. Well it’s time to act Mr Minister before we place a number of dead bodies at the door to your plush office.
The other attention drawn by the nurses is that of the poor hiring of staff by government. Too many people have been hired and placed in non-priority areas. More security personnel have been hired for a peaceful country when these posts should have been given to nurses and teachers.

Now we have government running around with a payroll and skills audit pretending to be hard at work trying to fix the problem. The fact that this exercise has taken over three years gives very little hope of success. This shows a lack of commitment.
The push on this exercise nowadays has been brought about by the cash-flow crisis. Government is struggling to pay salaries following the sharp rise in same since the reviews implemented recently and now needs to reduce the numbers.
This exercise will only last as long as there is no money as witnessed during the 2008-2010 financial crisis where government was forced to implement stringent fiscal measures that saw drastic cuts in expenditure. These stopped when a windfall from our cash-cow the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) came through.

Ironically these measures came two weeks after Cabinet had awarded itself a pay increase. We still await a formal declaration of a financial crisis by the head of government who needs to outline measures to be undertaken to ensure there is no loss of life brought about by gross financial negligence, misguided priorities and total disregard for human life.

FAREWELL TO DONNY AND ZODWA
The media fraternity is deeply saddened by the loss of two loyal servants to the profession. Zodwa Mavuso our Sub-Editor passed away last Friday after a determined battle against her ailment. Her demise was followed shortly by that of veteran journalist Donny Nxumalo. My sincerest condolences go to the families of both media colleagues who have made a valuable contribution to the profession. We are honoured to have shared their lives as they helped us develop in many ways. May their good souls rest in peace.